


Lacerated Hearts

by Eternal Scribe (Shadowcat)



Series: Serrated Etchings [1]
Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Grief/Mourning, Guilt, Heavy Angst, Implied/Referenced Incest, M/M, Past Character Death, Suicide, Undeserved Blame
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-30
Updated: 2017-01-30
Packaged: 2018-09-20 21:58:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9517850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shadowcat/pseuds/Eternal%20Scribe
Summary: Here's the weight of the world on my shouldersOn my shouldersAll alone I pierce the chainAnd on and on the sting remainsAnd dying eyes consume me nowThe voice inside screams out loud -- ShinedownAfter events beyond any of their control, Fili visits Kili and worries over what he finds. He never imagined that things had gotten this bad.





	

**Author's Note:**

> An entry for the Gathering Fiki Winter Fandom Raffle Exchange. 
> 
> Prompt #118 - **Dying Embers**
> 
> This got so much more angsty and darker than I had planned when I started writing it.
> 
> Please read the tags before you read the fic so as not to be squicked.

He hated seeing him drink.

He knew what no one else did -- that when he was hurting and alone in their apartment, he took a bottle of whatever he had nearby and went out onto the balcony. There he would sit and drink until the bottle was empty or the sun rose. It was always one of those two things.

If it happened more often than it did, he supposed that someone would have noticed what was happening long before now. If it ever made him sick, maybe one of the others would have realized just how badly he was hurting.

However, the drinking only seemed to happen when things had piled up so much inside him that he had no other outlet. The problem was that it was happening more often as of late and this was the fourth time in three weeks he had stood here and watched him. For the fourth time in three weeks, he watched him pour glass after glass with shaking hands and silvery tears sliding down his cheeks.

He hated it. He hated knowing that he was hurting so badly that he was harming himself like this and no one else realized. He hated seeing the pain in his eyes that drove him to seek solace in the bottom of a bottle.

How had no one realized that Kili was drinking more and more often? For that matter, why was Kili alone so much? He knew there was a rift between Kili and their relatives, but where were Kili’s friends?

How did no one realize that the fire that made Kili such a bright spirit had been gutted?

Once more he growled and lunged for the glass of the bottle that Kili held to his lips.

Once more he watched in sadness and anger as his hand passed right through the glass.

Being incorporeal like this allowed him to get into the apartment, but it also prevented him from being able to do any good for his beloved.

“Kili,” he begged. “Kili, please don't do this to yourself. Beloved, you are worth so much more than this. Don’t let what happened to me destroy you.”

As usual, Kili didn’t hear him. He never did. It had been this way ever since the night he had died.

The night of the car accident.

The night that Kili woke up and Fili didn’t.

“You promised, Fili,” Kili’s sobs broke more of Fili’s heart. “You promised that you would never leave me.”

“Oh, Kee…”

“Mama and Uncle hate me, Fee. Mama said it should have been me that died that night and she’s right,” Kili took a long drink straight from the bottle this time. “You should be here instead of me. It should have been me.”

Fili felt a new rage welling up within him to mix with his sorrow. How could their family blame Kili for what happened? He hadn’t been the one driving and even if he had been, the crash was the fault of the other driver. It made no sense that Kili was left to deal with his horrible pain and grief all on his own.

“It wasn’t enough that my twisted love corrupted you, no,” his brother choked through his sobs. “I had to go and kill you, too.”

“No, Kee, don’t ever think that! If anyone corrupted anyone it was me that corrupted you. I was the elder brother, the one who should have protected you.” 

But there was no protecting Kili or himself from what had been in both of their hearts and souls. For years, he had tried to hide it, tried to fight his different feelings so that Kili wouldn’t hate him. Finding out that Kili had felt the same way had made him believe that their bond was created by a Deity beyond their comprehension or power. 

His mind was pulled back to the scene in front of him. His brother and lover had gotten up from the floor to teeter over to the cupboard where they had always kept their alcohol. It was far more emptier than Fili remembered and he wondered just how much Kili had been drinking that he hadn’t seen. He frowned when Kili grabbed two bottles of the really heavy duty stuff and returned with his bounty to where he had been on the floor. He couldn’t recall ever seeing his brother drink this much and dread rolled through his stomach. He watched Kili open one of the bottles and take a very long drink that ended with him choking and then gasping through a coughing fit.

“Idiot,” Fili murmured softly. “You know how much Everclear burns when you swallow it. That's why you’re supposed to take small sips in mixed drinks instead of great gulps. 190 proof is no joke, Kee.” He frowned when Kili reached for the second bottle and he made a quick lunge for it, only to growl in renewed frustration when his hand passed through the bottle. “No! Don't mix absinthe with the Everclear!”

This much alcohol content was going to make Kili sick -- if not give him a severe case of alcohol poisoning. He had never, ever seen his beloved mix alcohol when he was drinking. Even in the days directly following the accident, Kili had never been quite so self-destructive with the drinking.

Which meant that something had happened today that had come close to shattering Kili and all of his ability to cope with the way his world had been irrevocably changed.

Kili choked on the absinthe, but that didn’t stop him from continuing to drink it until he had to pull up for air. Tears were streaming from his eyes as he stared out through the balcony railings. However, it didn't appear that he was actually seeing anything outside of his despair and pain.

“Is it true, Fili? Was Thorin right when he said that you purposefully steered our car into the other lane because you knew no other way to get away from me?” 

Fili felt his jaw drop as he stared at his broken love who was trying to drink from the two bottles at one time.

“Why was that? You had to of known that I would have done anything for you. I would have left town and never spoke to you again if that was what you wanted. You said… you told me that there was nothing wrong with me loving you like I did and that you had loved me even longer. Why? Why did you lie, Fee? You didn’t have to kill yourself because of me. I never wanted you to hurt. I never wanted to cause you that kind of pain. I would have broken my own heart to spare you hurt and shame.”

Fili listened to the words pouring from Kili in shock. There were many emotions that he was feeling over this information and he didn’t know which one to react to first.

Had their uncle really told Kili that Fili had killed himself to get away from him? What the hell? Thorin had to know that his logic was bullshit! Was Kili so broken down that he believed something so insane and lacking in even the tiniest bit of truth?

Seeing the way that his beloved was currently trying to drown himself in alcohol, Fili was forced to see that those words had indeed gotten to his brother. Kili actually believed something so hurtful and dark that he was making himself sick.

“Mama says you didn’t purposefully kill yourself, that you were trying to get rid of me.” Kili dropped the bottle, spilling it before he managed to pick it up again. “I would have prefered that, you know. I would rather that I had died, instead. Then I wouldn’t have to live without you or ever have known how depressed and angry you were.” He drank more absinthe before choking on another sob. “I wish that I was the one that had died. I wish you were here and I was gone. No one would miss me and everyone is lost without you.”

Fili’s heart clenched. He couldn’t fathom being alive and having Kili dead in his place. Kili was his moon and the only one who had ever truly knew him.

“Everyone hates me, Fili. Everyone blames me. They need you.”

Fili once more wished he could still physically touch things. He wanted to smash every piece of furniture in sight. He wanted to shake sense into every member of their family…

He wanted to sit down behind Kili and pull him into his arms to comfort him like he had done so many times before in their lives.

He doubted that their cousin, Gimli, held any hate or blame for Kili. Older than his brother by a year, the three of them had been best friends and pretty much inseparable most of their lives. Gimli had been the first one told of their changing relationship and he had accepted them without question. He told them that it made a kind of sense considering how closely they had been bonded all of Kili’s life.

So where was Gimli right now? Where were Kili’s best friends, Legolas and Tauriel? Where were his best friends, Elladan and Elrohir? These were the five people that made up their inner circle, so why was Kili all alone in his pain tonight?

He knew that those five would never have blamed Kili for his death. They never would have wished him pain, so where were they?

Fili frowned as he looked around the apartment and realized a few things that he hadn’t noticed before. The rest of the living room didn’t look like it had seen much use or tidying up in who knew how long. He was beginning to think that he had missed a few things in the visits he had been making.

Leaving Kili alone in the living room, he wandered through the rest of the apartment. He bypassed the steps that led up to the loft because he wasn’t yet ready to visit the place the two of them had spent so much time together while he was alive. They had fallen in love with the apartment because of the fact that it had such a large loft area that made the perfect master bedroom. Even if they weren’t having sex, they’d hang out reading or studying or even just curled up talking. 

Shaking his head, he frowned as he realized that the rest of the apartment looked as if it had been abandoned. The guest bedroom and bathroom were coated in dust and the bathroom looked dingy in a way he had never seen it before. Kili had always been so obsessive about making sure the entire apartment was spotless and organized.

Worried even more than he had been before, Fili stepped into the kitchen. He frowned as he looked around. There were dishes all over the place and lots of take-out containers strewn across the counters. When he got closer, he could see that most of them were still mostly full of food. That meant Kili had been existing mostly on alcohol for a long time.

Once more, he wondered why no one had seemed to notice how badly Kili was doing. How did nobody see that his brother was being destroyed?

He closed his eyes with a sigh, trying to push down his own sorrow. He wished that night had never happened. He wished he hadn’t died.

Most of all, he wished he could have prevented all of the pain that his beloved was now having to deal with.

A crash from the living room had Fili opening his eyes and then running to where he had left Kili. What he saw made fear crawl up his body and into his throat. It would be choking him if he wasn’t already dead.

Kili was sitting up on his knees in the middle of what looked the like the remnants of several broken bottles. As he watched, his brother took another deep drink of the absinthe as he picked up a large piece of broken glass.

“No, Kili,” he breathed. “Oh no, don’t do it.”

But, even now, his brother couldn’t hear him. 

Fili was helpless to do anything as Kili finished drinking the absinthe and just let the bottle drop to the floor. Kili slowly ran the glass shard up his arm as he tilted his head to watch how it moved across his skin.

“If I give up my life in exchange, do you think the gods would bring you back, Fili?” Kili’s voice was soft as he ran the glass back down his arm. “If I willingly give myself up, then maybe you could come back so everyone would be happy again.” He let out a harsh sigh and tightened his fingers on the shard as he pressed it against his inner arm. “Tell them I’m sorry. I’m so sorry and I love you, Fili. That will never change and I only regret that it caused you so much pain.”

“No, Kili, no!” Fili started shouting as he watched the blood appeared on his brother’s arm. There was so much blood and Kili kept cutting into his arm deeper. “Please, no. No!”

Fili dropped to his knees as Kili slumped against the wall, watching as his blood pooled and then ran down his arm to the floor. His fingers opened and the shard of glass dropped free. Letting out a harsh cry of pain, Fili went to wrap his arms around Kili, too shocked to question why he was able to connect with his brother’s body finally after all of this time. He pulled him against his chest, tears dropping into Kili’s hair as he buried his face in it. 

“I love you, Kili. I love you.”

When he felt Kili’s breathing slow, he couldn’t help talking to him, wishing like hell he could have done anything to prevent Kili thinking he had no other recourse. Not wanting to see any more of Kili’s blood pool onto the floor, Fili closed his eyes, tightening his arms around the most important person in his world.

He hoped more than anything that this would haunt their family to the end of their days. In Fili’s eyes, it was their fault that Kili had come to this.

Even after Kili’s heart finally stopped beating, Fili sat there in their former apartment holding onto him. He left him once. He wouldn’t leave him again.


End file.
